


Scars of Our Past

by ASOUEfan



Category: Ratched (TV)
Genre: Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Confessions, Detox, F/F, Femslash, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Implied/Referenced Non-con, Light Dom/sub, Non-Graphic Violence, References to Drugs, Rope Bondage, Sexuality Crisis, Softness, Swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-07
Packaged: 2021-03-17 01:41:32
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29217384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ASOUEfan/pseuds/ASOUEfan
Summary: While putting in orders at the Pharmacy for Dr Hannover, Mildred Ratched is nearly assaulted by a desperate girl on the street. Unperturbed, and believing everyone redeemable, Mildred takes you home and forces a cold-turkey drug detox, rather than allowing you to run away and continue the cycle of self destruction.
Relationships: Mildred Ratched (Ratched)/Original Character(s), Mildred Ratched/Reader
Comments: 7
Kudos: 50





	1. Chapter 1

The high street was bustling with it’s usual mid-morning rush. Mothers pushing perambulators trying to quieten their wailing infants, delivery drivers carrying boxes in from their vans - likely parked illegally, and labourers taking a cigarette break loitering around their van. Their heads turn as a brightly coloured woman strides down the sidewalk, her hat tipped slightly to the right, handbag perched on her left forearm, the two angles mirroring each other in such a way that Mildred appreciates the mathematical precision of it. There was a reason that things are the way they are, and the matching of bold colours and angles is something that Mildred can quantify and understand, even if those who are attracted by her did not.

Mildred passes a children’s clothing store and the city newspaper offices, reaching inside her handbag for the prescription Dr Hannover has tasked her with delivering to the chemists. She looks up at the glowing green sign _Stewards Pharmacy! Fast and efficient service!_ She leans into the door with a gloved hand.

“Nurse Ratched, a very good morning to you.” The smiling pharmacist greets her, pushing his round glasses back up his nose in place. He dabs a handkerchief along his forehead and pockets it again. “Hell of a summer we’re having.”

Mildred was clicking her handbag closed when she heard the pharmacist’s flippant curse, as if his easy comment would be count among acceptable banter with other customers. But Mildred pauses, and slowly lifts her chin to stare at the man coolly. “I have the monthly order for Dr Hannover at the Lucia Street Clinic.” Mildred slides the paper across the counter and refolds her arms. “I’ll be back to the collect them tomorrow before the start of clinic hours.” Turning on her heel Mildred heads for the door unwilling to linger in this fetid pharmacy or with its proprietor a moment longer.

“Of course of course,” Mr Steward calls with a jolly chuckle. But as he scans his eyes down the prescription note he raises his arm and rushes around the counter. “Wait some of these are, a little unusual -“

“As is the work we do,” Nurse Ratched says sharply, slowly turning back to face him. 

“I-I won’t be able to get this prescription filled by the morning. I’ll have to order at least two items from the central dispensary,” Mr Steward complains, batting the paper with the back of his hand.

Mildred stalks back toward the pot-bellied pharmacist with a derisive expression. “The sign on your shop window says ‘quick and efficient service’. That is the service I would like to receive.”

Withering under her gaze, Mr Steward nods quickly. “Yes Nurse Ratched.” 

Mildred tilts her head - an acknowledgement of his compliance rather than her agreement - then pushes on the door and leaves. Assessing the state of the street before turning for her car, Mildred stares at the labourers - who are all staring at her, and slowly replaces her dark sunglasses. Young men with their sleeves rolled up, rough and ready types with sculpted arms from whatever work they do. Something low-wage and physical, Mildred determined, their staring too obvious and too sexual for Mildred’s liking. She touches the neat loops of her hair at the back - averting her anxiety as discreetly as she can - then turns off down the street, refusing to give the men another moment of her time.

She had parked down a side street to avoid the busy throng, able to take her time arranging herself in and out of the car without someone impatiently tooting their horn for her parking spot. Mildred unclips her handbag again as she nears her bright aqua-blue car, taking her eyes off her surroundings momentarily to find the ring of keys inside her bag.

It was just enough time.

The knife in your grip is barely a few inches long, but it scares the young mothers and housewives into throwing their handbags at you with a screech, and that’s all you want. No trouble, no fuss, just the dollar bills. Your muscles cramp painfully, your lips are caked and split from that punch your dealer gave you the other day. But it’s now or never. 

You bolt from the alley and duck your head slamming your shoulder into the woman’s middle, knocking her square into the side of her car. “What- !” Mildred coughs and gasps to catch her breath, feeling you grab the handle of her leather bag to snatch it away from her, but Mildred holds fast.

“Gimme your bag!” You yell in frantic bursts, yanking and wrestling the red-head for it, mind caught in a pre-fix fuzz. You can’t think straight. This isn’t going as it normally does, she's fighting you. You stagger back, point the knife at her threateningly. “Gimme it!”

Mildred slides her sunglasses off her nose and folds them, seasoned at handling patients in many states similar to the one you are in. “Now, why would I do that?” She retrieves something small and tube-like from her bag, then folded her hands neatly at her waist. You jab the knife at her and make another grab for it but she seems unfazed.

“Just gimme the bag lady!” You threaten, this wasn’t working out and before long someone would round that corner and see you, call the police or get involved and you can’t let that happen. You run at her with the knife - no options left - but a split second before your tiny blade can collide with her, the woman raises her arm and sprays something right in your face.

Within seconds your eyes are burning, stinging wretchedly, your eyelids blistering and you collapse to the floor scraping at your eyes in pain. “Fuuck!” You wail, kicking out and flailing, your body screaming in pain worse than any bad-high, or drawn out hunger when it had been too long.

Mildred Ratched just shakes her head, returns the pepper spray to her handbag and places it on the front seat of her car. A couple had been crossing the road, the young man having stopped and stared to see if she was alright, but Mildred waves them along. You won't be any trouble now. Instead she crouches beside your trembling body and takes a firm hold of your wrist, drags your sleeve up and scoffs disappointedly, confirming her initial assessment. “Disgusting habit.”

The world is black, your eyes swollen and burned shut, but you feel a pair of hands grapple you under the arms and after that, manoeuvring you to your feet. You throw your arms out in front of you ready to fight, the little knife in your hand waving hopelessly around in defence. “No - no what are you doing who is that - ?!” You panic, unable to see unable to think past the pain and the scorching need thumping through your veins. You need a fix and now you’re a mess, strung out and burned up with pepper spray and if you don'y deliver you’ll get more than a beating from your higher-ups.

“My name is Mildred Ratched, I’m a nurse,” She explains with authority, folding forward the front seat of her car, and with a hand on the top of your head to guard you from knocking into the metal, shoves you onto the back seat.

“What are you doing?!” You feel and fumble around, barely able to prise your eyes open enough to realise you were in a car - her car.

Mildred’s heels clack on the asphalt as she rounds the car to the drivers seat, arranges the skirt of her dress and starts the car. “I’m going to cure you. That’s what nurses do.” 

——————

Mildred lives in a two-up two-down detached town house with a modest front yard. She parks right outside and pushes you in front of her, herding you like an animal up the path and the few steps to a deep green front door. “Don’t even think about running,” She snaps as she unlocks it, gesturing you inside. The door was darker than the sage-green painted on the rest of the wood cladding; the door- and window frames white making them stand out, like snowdrops on a forest floor, a splash of purity amongst the weeds. It's the fanciest place you’ve ever been invited into - and for a moment you aren’t sure you want to soil it with your presence. You stare at the front facade, intimidated by its straight lines and neat guttering. Nothing broken, nothing left to rot. Even the flower beds are tended, and likely given more care than you've ever known.

You itch your fingers over your scalp, bite your nails and shake your head at her. “You don’t want me in here lady -“

Undeterred, Mildred closes the door after you both and sets her bag and keys on the hallway stand, turning a little side lamp on as she went. “Ratched. My name, is Ms Ratched; and no I don’t _want_ you in my house, but you tried to rob me. So you thrust yourself into my affairs whether I cared for it or not.” She follows your aimless wanderings with a metre or so’s distance, knowing eventually you will take the stairs in search of more valuable items like jewellery.

Scratching your arms, your fingernails pick at old puncture sites as you walk. “You gonna call the police on me?” You ask her suspiciously, darting from room to room in your listless meanderings.

“I should, it would be simpler, heaven knows.” Mildred smiles to herself, correct in her deduction of where you would head next. “But no.” She removes her hat and hangs it on the hat stand, straightening it there just so, losing sight of you momentarily. Hats are like holy things, and needs due attention did you want them to keep their shape. Mildred skims her hand up the bannister rail as she trails you to the upstairs, finding you snooping in the master bedroom. “The police would be no help to you. Prison, offers nothing more than an easier path to your next fix.”

You glance over your shoulder at her with a grin. “You can make good profit in prison. So I’m told.” Catching your reflection in her vanity mirror, the shocking state of you captures your attention momentarily. The fresh pink mottling around your eyes from her pepper spray interesting and new, but the fading bruise to your right eye was not. You rub your fingers over it, kneading your fist into your eyes as if you could smudge it away, and then blink again.

Mildred is careful, _not cautious_ , as she approaches. Cautious is someone who plans in case of bad things happening; Mildred _knows_ bad things will happen, for they had already happened in her life. So having rope, as well as weapons and a safe of money in her wardrobe is simply being prepared for the next occasion. “For drug addicts, such as yourself, there is - I’m sorry to say - a harder road to take, should you seek redemption,” She preaches, sneaking closer behind you.

You watch her reflection come alongside yours in the mirror, so delicately made up compared to your bruised and dirt smeared face. She's wearing smart red lipstick, a flick of blush on her cheekbones and smooth black eye-liner that accentuates her already dark eyes. She's beautiful, were you into that sort of stuck-up look on a woman. Fuck, if any of the men in your life knew you look at women like this - they'd convert you back before you were given a chance to even experiment. Your fists ball and you jab your forehead punishingly, only to realise something is being wrapped around your other hand - and wrist. 

“What are you doing? Get off me - !” You spin round fast, but Mildred is faster.

“The shakes aren’t bad yet, but they will become so. The sweating, next the vomiting, you’ll be a danger to yourself, as well as to me.” She knots the rope and jerks you the half a metre or so to the bed, fastens it to the bed frame and readies the next length of rope, knowing you are disorientated enough, gagging for that fix to mellow your agitated cravings that you will remain fairly easy to subdue.

That is until the cycle starts again, and you’re on the street robbing another unsuspecting woman, less capable that herself. Mildred knows it's her duty to intervene, and help you.

“Get these fucking ropes off me you psycho!” You twist and tear at the restraints, long hair flying widely about your face as you fight. A firm pair of hands knock you onto the bed. 

“Believe me when I say you have no other choice,” Mildred pants, almost enjoying the adrenaline thrill of it, taking advantage of your momentary confusion to grapple your other wrist. Not all patients were capable of verbalising their desire for help, but by being driven to such lengths as to rob a woman in broad daylight, you were crying out for help - in your own way. “You must face yourself and rid your body of this poison!” Mildred proclaims as she fixes your other wrist to the headboard - arms splayed wide, your upper body immobilised.

Safely tethered in place, Mildred gives herself a moment to adjust her dress back into position, smoothing a hand down the button line of her chest and the check her skirt fastening is directly on her left hip bone where it should be. She draws tall, takes a long breath in through her nose and more calmly now, is able to snatch at each of your kicking legs to tie and secure your ankles too. 

You're restrained on a strange woman’s bed like a starfish, arms wide, legs splayed, and just when all the worst things a person could do to another are starting to float into your head as dangerous possibilities - Mildred sits down in an armchair across the room. “What you’re just gonna sit there?!” You scream, snapping your legs and arms and arching your back, sounds ripping from your chest as you refuse to give in and frustration takes over. You need to get out of here - get cash if this tight bitch isn’t gonna let you thrift any, and sneak on the bus back across town to the industrial strip where there's plenty of powder to be had. Your kit is hidden there; and there's a few different mattresses you use when you're using that you considere safe enough to pass out on. There's places for people like you, even if the rest of society doesn’t know about them, or simply doesn’t want to see them. It's all you know. Not fancy houses and cotton sheets like this.

Mildred unbuttons the cuffs of her dress-sleeves and folds them over to mid-forearm as she speaks. “I must stay and watch over you, because to get through this you will need me.” She would usually begin the slow process of unpinning her hair around this time - settling down for the afternoon, or evening were she to have worked a longer day shift at the clinic. But her free afternoon is not hers any longer, and considering the work that lies ahead of her, Mildred decides keeping her hair up and out of the way, is advisable.

“I don’t need you you crazy bitch!”

The light chuckle you hear from her fills your gut with bile. “The detoxification process should take all of 3 or 4 days. But to you, it will feel like an eternity.”

\-----

She was right. For 3 days and 3 nights you fight the ropes that tie your ankles and wrists to the bed. You thrash and cry out, begging her for something to take the edge off your craving, swearing and cursing and then weeping with apologies, promising her anything she wants if she would just give you a little. You tell her where she can go and buy it, who to look for, who your dealer is, everything you could to compel her to help you.

True to her word, Mildred sits in that armchair across the room, reading when she can, occasionally lying a blanket over her lap to doze. But mostly she's on her hands and knees scrubbing soapy water on the patterned rug to clear up your vomit, before tending to you directly, dabbing a wet flannel around your mouth to clean the sick away.

Sometimes you feel your body go rigid, shake and twitch uncontrollably and your eyes roll back in your head. Those times she rushes to your side and shoves something into your jaws to bite down on before you swallow your tongue; she holds your head carefully between her hands so you don't hurt yourself, timing the seizure with the clock on her bedside.

Coming out of such events - you weep harder, and she says nothing. Mildred changes the bedsheets from under you, for every time you would wet the bed and the warm wet humiliation is too much to bear. So she smooths fresh linens down, your body limper and weaker as the days drag on, giving in to the gentle touches and sensations offered when she bathes the sweat off you. You refuse to admit how good that feels, because you hate her, and hate the world and hate the man who first put a needle in your arm.

You stare out the window across the room, unable to really see the street. But it's _something_ , and give's you distraction outside of this room and this bed. Watching dappled shadows dance on the curtains is movement and life you could focus on, the tree outside swaying as the wind caught it’s leaves. You feel something cold on your chest, and slowly roll your head on the pillow to see what she’s doing.

Mildred holds the stethoscope to your skin between two firm fingers, the buds in her ears listening to the rhythm and pace of your heartbeat. “The arrhythmia is gone. That’s a good sign.” She folds the stethoscope and lays it on the night stand before sitting next to you. “And you haven’t had a seizure in almost twelve hours.”

“So…,” You croak, your whole body aching, but not from cravings. The cramping was gone, the buzzing headache and the manic way your stomach used to twist in hunger that no amount of hamburgers could sate.

Mildred settles her hands in her lap. “It’s not easy, but you are beating this.”

You scoff and tug away, though the ropes only give you leverage enough to vaguely shift while constantly pulling you back, but you feel like you’re rebelling by doing it. “Forcing me to go cold turkey isn’t beating nothing.” You flop back on your back tiredly, this the only position the ropes would be limp and not worsening the deep rope-burns now scoring your wrists and ankles.

She lifts a glass of water and holds it toward you, a small round white tablet pinched between the fingers of her other hand. “Open up,” Mildred instructs, giving you a look akin to a schoolmistress.

You peer at the tablet - and her. “What is it?”

Mildred rests her arms down a moment, balancing the water on her knee. “A light sedative, nothing that will affect your recovery, I promise you.” She can see the distrust in your eyes, and after everything she has done for you it almost offends her. But Mildred also knows you won’t remember much of the confessions that tripped from your lips, the promises you’d made if only she would give you your drugs, or the fears you’d seen come to life as paranoid hallucinations as she held your hand and hushed your panicked sobs. “But your body needs to rest, if you are to recuperate.” You’d only remember being thrown into her car and tied to a bed.

Your detox was intimate and awful and hers alone, to remember.

Mildred proffers the tablet and water again, and this time you open your mouth for her obediently, if only from some youthful edict to do as you were told. “How do you know about…tablets and heart beats and stuff?” You curl the tablet back on your tongue, sip the water as she places the glass on your lips, and swallow.

“I did tell you I’m a nurse. But not only that, I work for Dr Hannover, one of the foremost physicians of his time. He treats patients, every other doctor has turned away.” Mildred Ratched smiles proudly as she places the glass down. “He does some remarkable work.”

You wiggle your feet back and forth, fidgeting and scoffing at her being all high and mighty. You didn’t ask for this, to be here, to be treated like you were sick. You aren’t sick, the world had just chewed you up and spat you out and that isn’t your fault. “I don’t give a shit,” You spit angrily, turning your head away in defiance.

Mildred picks up the glass of water, kneeling one leg up on the bed to lean exactly where she needs to - to tips the glass, pouring the water smack into your face as punishment, like a fountain from upon high. You splutter and thrash your head side to side coughing the water out your mouth, staring at her in indignation. “What the f-“

“Now that you’re, more lucid -“ The red-head cuts in determinedly, “There are rules in my house that will be adhered to.” She dries her hands and clasps them at her waist, still standing.

You growl up at her. “I’m tied to a bed you wanna give me house rules?!”

“There will be no cursing, under my roof, of any kind,” Mildred barks, authoritative and stern. You quieten, maybe its her imposing nature or maybe its the tablet kicking in, you’re not sure. “Manners, are par for the course - but with you I feel I have to make such things clear.” She lifts her eyebrows, awaiting acknowledgement that you’re listening.

You shoulder shrug a response. “Fine, whatever …”

“Yes Ms Ratched, is what you say.”

“Alright!” You snap at her. Despite how insistent you are that you don’t want to be here or be some special patient of hers, that you’re not gonna follow any stupid rules - your limbs are feeling heavier. Your hands flop, dangling limply in their restraints. Your breathing slows, each inhale deeper and steadier.

Her palm collides with your cheek sharply. "Yes Ms Ratched." She repeats her expectations once more. 

"Yes Ms Ratched."

Mildred lifts her perfect red lips into a curved smile, and watches your eyes float closed. “My good girl.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for language, era-typical homosexual remarks, implied assault.

Part 2

With a five-dollar note in your pocket and a fresh set of clothes, you’re itching to get out the door. But she’s over there half guarding the exit, still talking on the phone. Your leg is jigging, fidgeting, you’re biting your nails. You need to go.

Mildred believes she’s covered the necessities for you to continue your rehabilitation. The possibility of change has been given to you, and the lesson in it hard learned. Her bedroom rug shows the worst of what had been, but material things can be replaced, a life cannot. 

Mildred watches you perched on her plaid sofa, flicking through a magazine like you’re in the clinic waiting room and not her own home. She fingers the telephone cable, waiting for them to finalise and agree a short-term placement; there is usually beds available if you know who to ask. Mildred catches herself in a smile. This is a good thing, and her conscience will feel better for knowing you have a place to sleep tonight. 

“There is a bed for you, at this address. It’s a - homeless shelter. For women.” Mildred walks through from the hall and sits near you - but not too close. You’re still not keen on her, and she’s careful not to push that. “You should be safe there.” 

You take the slip of paper, flicking the edge of it inwardly debating the merits of accepting her help. This time she’s not tying you to a bed and forcing you, but maybe it would be easier if she did. “For how long?” You look up to her, a vague hope in your eyes. A refuge for women, means he won’t be there, at least. 

Mildred clasps her hands at her waist, a reluctant professionalism coming over her. “A week. After that, well, you’ll have to make your own arrangements.” What she’s done for you is more than her duty; it’s intimate, and terrible, but it’s over and she must move you along. You’re not a stray cat, after all. 

A week. And then what? You owe Huck money and he doesn’t write off debts easily. “Fat lot of help a week is.” You scrunch up the paper and toss it on the coffee table, ungrateful. 

Mildred sucks her lips in, remaining resolute. “I would have expected at least a tHuck you -“

“THucks. There,” You sneer sarcastically. You don’t owe this woman a thing. You’d not asked her for help, she’d taken it up on herself and like everyone else in your life you’ll end up disappointing her. So what’s the point? 

“The shelter is expecting you to check-in this afternoon, I will drive you,” Mildred informs you, her tone firm. Already hooking her arm through the handbag straps, car keys and gloves in the other she looks at you with raised eyebrows. “Well?” 

“I’ll make my own way,” You snap, pulling the meagre money from your pocket as you yank the front door open, checking they're there. Five dollars. It’s not much. She’s clever not to give enough for you to score, but it’ll cover a meal or two.

“Will you?” Mildred stares at you, the edges of her expression softening, her eyes already filling with the worry that you won’t. She begins to say something, but can’t find the words, and looks down. Best not. 

“Course,” You shrug, eyeing the road up and down. Even on this pretty side of town they could’ve tracked you down, so you shouldn’t linger. 

Mildred tenses as she takes the door handle from you, guarding her home once more. “Well then, I wish you luck.” 

—————-

Lunchtime comes, and goes. Mildred changes her bedsheets, smoothing the last of you from the creases in her life. She picks at the knots of rope that once secured you, and folds the lengths together, her foot on the pedal of the bin, hovering the rope over the long drop fall into darkness. 

Mildred slips her toe from the bin pedal, and clutching the rope, ties a little ribbon around it and instead stows it in her nightstand. Memories are memories, and it feels wrong to just throw you away. 

In the bathroom she wipes the make-up from her eyes with a cotton pad, clutching the edge of the sink and staring at her reflection. Is it wrong to have enjoyed the process? To have companionship, her home less a shell and more a shelter, cocooning you both together for such awful unspoken moments to be shared? 

She ties her bed-robe around her waist and pads downstairs, warming up a stew dinner then sets it on the dining table. From here she can see the telephone in the hallway, the receiver hanging lifeless on its cradle. Fork on the left, knife on the right, coasters in straight lines. Mildred adjusts them until they're neat, ordered, and draws her chair back to sit down. The meat is bland, but Mildred is unable to concentrate on which herbs would have complemented the meal, for she catches herself looking at the telephone again. 

Shouldn't the shelter have called by now? It’s early evening, and they’d promised to inform her of your safe arrival. She touches her napkin to her mouth, then lays it on her lap. Hadn’t she done enough? Offered you a way out?

Still, as evening draws in Mildred keeps her radio programs on low volume, lest she miss the phone ringing. She folds a woollen blanket over her lap and stays on the sofa, every so often turning, gripping the back of the sofa to stare at it again. One time she gets up, and fiddles with the wire in the wall, checks the dial tone, needing to make sure. 

Mildred doesn’t sleep, only dozes, much like the last few days. Her own dreams reveal the paranoid worries plaguing her, instead of fighting yours for you she has to face her own. 

But morning dawns and Mildred promptly dresses, unwinds the net from her curled up-do, and paints back on her lipstick in the mirror. “Apathy helps nobody,” She tells to herself, folding a pearl-white scarf around her neck and tucking it in her lapel, nodding in approval of her reflection. “Action, is what counts.” 

She locks her front door, half holding onto the expectation you’ll be asleep on the porch - a stray cat after all. But you’re not there, and you’re not in the alley where she first met you. Met you. Mildred shakes her head, feeling silly for romanticising your behaviour. You’d threatened her at knifepoint, launched forth from the shadows of the alley thrusting desperate jabs of that silly little knife making demands of money, as you had had success with before, no doubt. Mildred searches the alley for any sign that you had been back there, then the street itself, up and down other hiding places that could have sheltered you over night. She sits back in her car, refusing to give in. Mildred uncaps her lipstick again, adjusts her rearview and reapplies the colour, giving herself this time to think. Concentrate on the small things, while her mind grapples with the what if’s. 

Of course. Mildred caps the lipstick and smiles to it. It’s a technique she’d learnt from listening to Dr Hannover’s hypnosis sessions he gives addled patients, teaching them to focus on one thing at a time, and block out the voices that torment them. She has no malady of course, and her anxieties are quite within the normal bounds of one human being worrying on another. But the knowledge it works, makes Mildred chuckle softly.

You’d told her everything she needs to know to find you. Your favourite sleeping spots, where your stashed your kit, the name of your dealer - all to compel her to go out and buy you a little, as you sweated and vomited and cries ripped from your throat in anguish. Mildred had stood by her duty, knowing giving in to your pleas was the wrong action at the time. 

But now, it is exactly right. 

Mildred drives across town to the industrial strip, slowing as shops and houses give way to large warehouses and factories. The sort of people on the street change; no longer suited men going to and from their cars to the office, or mothers with young children in tow and a net of vegetables hanging from their arm; now it’s grease smeared faces of sullen factory men, and women with - less than adequate clothing - loitering on the corners. Mildred’s heart races. She should never find herself places like this, but here she is, driving around the blocks slowly, gripping her steering wheel and looking left and right, searching the doorways for you. Her chest tightens. Nothing. 

Eventually she parks up, staring up and down the sidewalk as she locks the car and hurries to put the keys away. Danger here is more immediate, more real than parking on a regular high street, and a potential assault would consist of more than you and that little knife. 

Mildred grips the neck of her coat tightly closed, holding onto her conviction. You need her. She needs you. Mildred shakes her head quickly tossing the thought away and marches her heels down the gravely pavement toward her destination. Your details and directions are perfect, which would amuse Mildred were she not fearing for her personal safety so greatly. 

She ducks inside the low hollow doorway, corrugated metal either side of her funnelling her toward a small room of what would have been an office, at some time in its life. Smashed furniture and broken windows set a scene of what only becomes worse the more she ventures into the darkness. The glow of a cigarette tip here, the flicker of a match there. Moans echo through the warehouse, and she walks out onto a metallic walkway, stairs offering a path down to the main floor, a sea of cardboard boxes and tented structures not fit for even the worst of humanity. But there are people stumbling about, Mildred can hear them coughing, smell them even from up here. Is this really - ? She covers her mouth with the back of her hand, the stench thick. 

Her heels clang as she descends the stairs, gripping the cold rusted metal to steady her step, but as soon as her feet hit solid ground two men confront her. 

“I think you’re lost lady.” 

Mildred clutches her handbag to her chest, both arms protecting it - and herself. “I-“ She begins, faltering too quickly. Past the thugs are those mattresses, limp forms lying on them, too many of them clearly women. One of these might be you, and she can’t just leave you here, not now, not with them. “I’m here for a friend. To take her home.”

“No friend o’yours here,” One says. “These girls are ours.” 

“Best turn around now," warns the other. 

Mildred lifts her chin and stares the roughly-dressed stubble-cheeked man dead in the eye. He’s likely standing in every piece of clothing he owns, Mildred deduces, judging by the fraying cuffs, and the layers of shirts and moth-eaten jumpers he has on. These cavernous metal-walled warehouses offer little warmth. Her own hands are quivering- but hidden inside gloves. Her heart races deep in her chest. None of her fear can be seen - for Mildred offers only a stony expression of confidence. “No.”

He laughs, breath stinking of drink and cigarettes. “No? Then who’s your friend?” 

“Her name is - “ Mildred stalls, eyes lowering a moment as if visually searching her memories. What is your name? “Well her dealer’s name is Huck. His face is …” She gestures vaguely, uncomfortable with saying something that could be taken as an insult, and earn her similar set of injuries. 

“Yeah we know Huck.” 

“You want one o’ his girls you’ll have to talk to him direct.” 

Mildred nods. “Well then, take me to him don’t just stand there.” 

The one guy smacks the others arm. “You heard the lady.” He slopes away, beckoning her to follow. 

Round to the left and under the stairway is a door to some downstairs rooms, likely more offices or break rooms, when this factory had been running. Inside the end room, led by the two thugs Mildred faces a whole cohort of men now. Half count dollar bills on one side of the room, the other half weigh and divide suspicious looking powder into different sizes of glass vial for resale. Amongst them, and doing no work at all, a shortish man with a thick black beanie hat pulled low over his brow watches her approach, and scrapes his chair back getting to his feet. “Whose this?” 

“I suppose you are the one I need to speak to. Mr - Huck.” Mildred clears her throat, lips pursed tightly. She doesn’t want to focus on the criminal activities going on around her, or dwell on any of the outcomes that might befall her at the hands of these men. Coming here was a foolish idea, and outright irresponsible not to have told Dr Hannover her whereabouts, so at least someone could follow up should she not return. Mildred draws her shoulders back and lets go of her coat lapels, forcing herself to stand proud, and unclips her handbag to retrieve her cheque book. “One of your girls -“ She begins, the term disagreeable to her, but Mildred knows she must use their own phrasing if she is to be understood. “Came to me for help. Now I have come for her, and will clear any debt she owes you, on the agreement you never sell narcotics to her again.” 

Huck laughs, pinches his nose and gestures his arms wide. “Why not, when I have so much for sale?” 

“I will compensate you, as well as cover her debts - “

Huck circles her slowly, smacking his lips together as he looks Mildred up and down, intending to scare her. But Mildred barely quivers, and the side of Hucks face that isn’t taught with scarring pulls into a smirk. “Wow, she must’ve really put out to reel in a sugar mommy like you.”

“Don’t be vulgar,” Mildred chides, not thinking of to whom she's talking. Close guards of Hucks stand off their posts, fists balling, and Mildred looks about her. 

“Tell you what sweetheart,” Huck bids them wait with a subtle raise of his hand, and creeps close to Mildred, close enough to breathe in her fruity perfume, and the sweat that beads between her breasts in well concealed fear. “Admit to me, what you really want with her. What that…” His hand slips between the sides of her coat so subtly Mildred doesn’t recognise it until he grabs her between the legs. “…tight cunt wants, and she’s yours.” 

Mildred jerks back and slaps his cheek in horror, but he’s grabbing the back of her neck and forcing her to take it. “Get off me!” Mildred barks at first, but his hand is touching places that trigger terrible things and she can’t, she can’t hold herself steady. Mildred shoulders curl in and she’s shaking, whining whispered prayers, “Please …,” She sniffs fearfully. 

“Admit it -“ He growls, fighting to hold onto her. 

“I-I want her …,” Mildred confesses. 

“More.”

“I want her to be mine!” Mildred sobs, crumpling to her knees as Huck lets her go. Mildred snatches up the sides of her coat protectively, breathing in heavy pants, cowering like a child. They're laughing at her, probably hurling spiteful words too but Mildred cannot hear them. Sapphic thoughts can earn her a spell in hydrotherapy. In conversion therapy. Electric shock treatment. But here she is, admitting it anyway - to a man no less - and the tear in Mildred’s heart rips wide open. She loved you the moment she saw you. 

Huck has already sent for you. He only has one girl stupid enough to hide out for a couple of days and then return - still empty handed - barely a few dollars in your pocket, knowing you’ll be paying for the rest one way or another. 

Your feet stumble across the smooth concrete. The closer you’re dragged to his office the more you begin to wake up, blink through your swollen eyes and shake your head. “No … no no no please!” You panic, fighting the two men who have you by the arms, “I can’t!” You’re thrown the ground smacking your face and no doubt worsening the state of it. Fists had bludgeoned you upon your return, only to send you off into a safe, drug induced dreamland. 

All those hours you’d thrashed and fought through the detox, undone in a single second. 

The thud of your body beside hers wakes Mildred from her pity, peeling her hands from her face and realising - it’s you. She kneels up, running her eyes over you, curled up and cold in just a thin cotton dress, bruises for days and fresh pink thrashes purpling on your pretty face. “Dear God what have you done to her,” Mildred gasps, ghosting her hands over you, trying to summon you to consciousness. “It’s me, I’m here - “

You bat her away, not understanding at first, until a soft plop of a tear hits your cheek, salty and warm. You force your eyes open, an auburn haired angel gazing down at you, weeping softly. “You …?” You croak.

“Can you stand?”

“What’re you doing here?” You cling on to her, sitting up slowly. “It’s not safe-“

“The shelter said you didn’t check in as arranged. I came to find you.” Mildred flutters a handkerchief from her coat pocket and licks the corner of it, then delicately wipes at the blood on your cheek. “To take you home.” 

You hold onto her arms, everything hurting, even her tenderness. This woman is crazy if she thinks she can save you from all this, from him and from yourself. She’s done it once, your subconscious says. 

Huck snorts, giving his pal a smack. “Hear that? She’s taking her home.” Huck waves Mildred to her feet, stepping close to jab his finger in her chest and sneering, “You’re disgusting.” 

Mildred twitches at his prodding, fearing he might push it further again. But looking into your bloodshot eyes, she finds the strength she needs. Mildred reaches into her bag - fingers curling around the hilt of that tiny knife you had threatened her with - and brings it out now. Her willowy arm stretching out in front of you both, Mildred makes sure Huck is listening. “Then we have something in common, don’t we.” Mildred spits, “And don’t think I mean your face. I mean your heart. The twisted blackness in your heart that corrupts and ruins others, that, is disgusting, and something I will not let continue.” 

“Don’t - “ You gasp, trying to hold her back but Mildred shrugs you off. She has no idea who she’s messing with, you’re not worth this, not worth her getting hurt for. 

He lifts his eyebrows, eyeing the tiny blade with amusement. “Oh I see, better do as the sappho says boys.” 

“Now, here is your check, I think you’ll find the sum suitable,” Mildred scribbles a number she hopes is high enough they leave you both be, rips it from her check book and throws it at him. “We’re leaving.”

“We are?” You stammer. 

“I’ve cleared your debts sweetheart, you’re free, now let's go -“

“I don’t think so,” Huck barks, nodding at the men behind you, who step in your path block the door. “I think you’ve got more to give -“

But before he finishes, Mildred whirls around snatching the scruff of his shirt in her fist - twisting it dragging him a down - just as her other arm swings back and jams the blade up through his throat. Up and up through his soft palette and his tongue, skewering him on it. Blood sputters from between his teeth, and Mildred staggers back with shallow heaving breaths. 

The room is so stunned, nobody moves. Except you. You grab her bloodied hand and bolt from the room, dragging her behind and running out the hallway, feet pounding up the metal steps and through the narrow corridor to the street, her eyes wide and fearful and not understanding what it is she’s just done. “Wheres the car?!” You shake her, but she’s not responsive. You snatch her handbag without reproach this time and rifling in it for her keys.

Mildred rubs the back of her glove under her nose, dribbling emotion giving away her fear and panic. She points down the street. 

You nod, and with an arm looping around her waist you run away down the street and around the corner, recognising that aqua blue car anywhere. You fumble the key into the drivers side and throw the seat forwards herding her into the back seat this time. “Get in - “

“W-what are you -“ Mildred chokes, “This is my car!” 

“I’m saving your ass, you crazy bitch,” You laugh, jumping to the drivers seat and just about seeing a gang of Hucks dealers pounding the pavement after you in the rearview, as you career out of the industrial strip and back across town, far far away from the bad dreams and the murdered kingpin who has ruled your life for too many years. 

Having enough wits about you to park down a side street, you ditch the car and pull her out, tucking her hands inside her coat in case the nice respectable folk around here should see the blood on her hands. 

————-

Mildred has pulled the curtains closed, locked the door and tucked a chair under the handle for extra measure. You’ve poured her a neat whisky and she’s still cradling it, though you’ve easily downed two tumblers already in the same space of time. “It’ll be alright,” You reassure her, tucking a blanket around her knees that you found folded by the fireplace. 

She smiles weakly in response. “Do you really think so?” 

“Yeah.” Yesterday you did everything you could to leave, rebuffing her offer to drive you to the shelter, wasting all her work because as suspected, you’d been weak. You’d crawled home to Huck and he’d been all too willing to ruin you. Now he lies on the floor of that warehouse, ruined, because of Mildred Ratched. “No-one’ll care about a dead drug dealer.” You nudge her glass and encourage her to drink, lifting it to her lips. 

Mildred blinks out of her daze. She’s a murderer. Perhaps. Neither of you had stayed long enough to know for sure, either way she’d risked herself for you and that was short-sighted of her. “I-I don’t know what I was thinking,” Mildred stammers, the whisky burning down her gullet reminding her she is alive, even if Huck is not. Her eyes tear up again as she looks at you, and traces her fingers down your hollow cheeks as though you’re a holy thing she cannot understand. 

You turn your cheek and kiss her cool fingertips. Mildred gasps and her touch is gone, cheeks burning shamefully. You reach for her hand and squeeze your fingers around hers gently, though she tries to tug away. “I heard what you said.” 

“When?” Mildred sits straight, sniffs and rubs her fingers under her eyes putting on a brave smile as though nothing untoward had happened today what so ever. “Would you like some tea? I imagine, you’ll feel a little sick again later.” She smoothes her hands down her skirt and stands, then moves about the kitchen feeling better for busying herself, filling the kettle and setting it to steep on the stove, collecting two cups and two saucers, two spoons. 

You slope after her and hang in the kitchen doorway, watching her carefully turn the cups so both handles point the same direction, so the spoons are laid delicately across their saucers. Mildred smiles at them. Two is better than one. 

“You said, you want me.” 

Mildred freezes. She turns, and rubs her arms. “Oh.” She sucks her lips in, then turns to wash her hands thinking she sees a speck of blood there, missed on her last round offhand washing. Maybe it's her imagination. She's not sure. But Mildred scours her skin any how. “He was - well I had to say something to -“ Mildred pretends as best she can. 

You meet her across the kitchen and catch her hands with the towel, rubbing them dry for her. “You don’t have to tie a girl to the bed if you want her to stay over, you know.” You dump the towel on the counter, and instead take her hips, shifting yourself closer. “Could’a just asked me Ms Ratched.” 

Mildred is unsure if she should laugh, or smile. How does one react to - being held by a woman? Her hip bones are bumping yours skirt to skirt and her breath catches when she looks up at you. Looking isn’t too bad, she debates, touching the corner of her lips where her lipstick is surely smudged. The contents of her handbag are scattered in the footwell of her car and she can’t reapply it now, but Mildred could do with the time to think what is the right thing to say, to refute what you’ve already heard her admit. 

She concentrates, a soft frown forming on her expression. Saying a thing and acting on it are different. So perhaps, you can form a comfortable companionship together. “So, you’ll stay?”

She thinks nothing of how alight her body feels, your hands just at the hem of her skirt, the edge of her blouse, and if you were to move them just so, your fingertips might feel between the material to her skin. Mildred’s chest tightens. She wants to step back - should step back - but instead she lays her hands on your chest and grips the dirty cotton of your dress in her hands. 

“I mean, it’s nicer than my mattress,” You joke.

"Well if that's all -"

"No! I mean to say - " You hurry to redress your mistake. This isn’t some folly, you’re not playing with her feelings for money and a roof over your heard. You respect her, and just because you’ve never been able to act on a thing buried inside you deep and safe, doesn’t mean you can’t now. “You saved my life Mildred.” You gently curl a stray lock of red hair behind her ear, and she blushes. 

Mildred strokes her finger and thumb under your chin, coaxing you to lean toward her lips. “You saved mine too,” Mildred murmurs, and kisses you. 


End file.
